It always starts this way. With a single blade of grass.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LANCE!! A day late, but better late than never.... This one's for you. <3


In honour of Lance Henriksen Blog Week, and Lance's birthday, I shall now talk even more about Millennium. 

I know what y'all are thinking: [OMG, does she ever shut the eff up about Millennium??]

Nope, sorry kids; she doesn't.

:D

My favourite episode of Millennium ever comes from season 2: "A Single Blade of Grass." Why is it my fav? I think that has something to do with this one Saturday night about 12 years ago. Mum had grounded me for no reason so that she could go out with her friends and leave me home to babysit Little Sis, who was 4 at the time. I was 14. Mum did that A LOT, and when you're 14 and you're not allowed to do anything, ever, you tend to become full of angst and rebelliousness. So this one night I decided to dig into my drug stash and take some acid. 

I have never claimed to be a maker of good decisions. 

After Little Sis went to bed, I dug out my most recent tape of stuff I recorded off the TV--mostly a mash-up of episodes of the X-Files, Oz, Daria, music videos, and of course, Millennium. The first episode on that tape was "A Single Blade of Grass."

I watched and then rewound and repeated that episode a total of four times. I dunno why--at that moment, with my brain all trippy and my mind all angry, I found comfort in that episode. And apparently conditioned myself to love that episode forever. It's like a security blanket. I have the entire script memorized. The images on the TV in the last post are from this episode.

So I'm going to summarize it for all y'all. 

The episode opens in New York City, where a construction site owner who wants to start building an office or something is battling with a bunch of archaeologists at the construction site. The site was apparently an Indian burial ground, and the archeologists, understandably, want to make sure it's carefully excavated. Construction Site Owner doesn't like this. 

And then the Archeologist, Dr. Liz digs up a dead body--not an old one from the burial ground. The recently dead body of an Indian. Construction Site Owner is double-pissed now, because his site has become a crime scene. 

Good thing Frank Black happened to be in New York!

The NYPD brings him in to investigate. Frank has a Vision.

The vision leads Frank to the basement of a fancy hotel across the street, where they find blood on the floor, and bloody hooks and chains hanging from the ceiling, Hellraiser-style.

...and drawings on the wall from pretty much every Indian tribe in North America. Frank brings Dr. Liz in to help. 

Her power animal is an ant.

Eventually, everyone puts two and two together--the guys working the construction site are all Indians. And the dead guy is an Indian. There's Indian drawings on the walls at the murder scene. Frank thinks they're a lost tribe of the Iroquois--one that split up and hid itself among the other North American tribes. 

So Frank goes to talk to the disgruntled Indians at the bar where they hang out.

And he shows them a picture of this weird circle symbol, asking them if they know what it means. 

The Indians are not helpful. 

But they lied. They know what the circle means, and they also know that the circle was NOT one of the symbols on the wall in the basement. The token Wise Old Indian says their Ancestors showed Frank the symbol in a vision. 

The Indians killed the dude at the burial site as part of some ritual involving a prophecy that will bring the buffalo back, and make the grass stop growing for the white man and junk. (Well, they accidentally killed him by feeding him too much snake venom.) The dead dude was supposed to travel the Spirit Road to the West and bring back the second guy from the prophesy. So since Frank is from Seattle and knows about the circle symbol, OBVIOUSLY he's the other one. 

The kind of crazy and also kind of hot Indian Leader believes so, anyway. And Frank has more visions, and tells Dr. Liz about them.

Oh yeah, and Frank accidentally kills the Construction Site Owner with the heart squeeze.

But that same night, the Indians kidnap Frank out of the museum. 

The cops and Dr. Liz look for him in the hotel basement, but no one is there. Then out in the street, Dr. Liz realizes there's smoke pouring out of the manhole covers.

Down in the sewers, the Indians are dancing around a fire and stuff, and they feed Frank snake venom. 

'Cause that totally worked the first time. 

Frank has some of the same visions as he did earlier (the long house, buffalo, etc.), but he tells the Crazy Indian Leader that the prophesy won't come true the way they want it to. They're looking for the wrong things. 

Crazy is pissed, so they feed Frank more snake venom.

But then Frank is rescued by Dr. Liz and the NYPD. Back up on the street, the cops catch some of the Indians while others run away. 

And then a herd of buffalo runs down the street.

The end!

http://millennium-thisiswhoweare.net/cmeacg/episode.php?mlm_code=205

One that looks nice. And not too expensive.

My dear friend Scarlet, the secretary across the hall, was fired over the weekend. I'm really upset about it. It was over something totally stupid, too; but it would take too long to explain. I apologize if you're now weeping in disappointment that you don't get to hear a load of office drama.  

So since Scarlet is now unemployed, I'm posting this link to her Associated Content page. If you love me, you will click it and check out her articles. Because she gets paid for like every 100 clicks on each article. 

That site is pretty cool actually. They pay you just for more or less posting blog entries, and you earn a few dollars per so many page views. 

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Last night, I was almost defeated by a moth.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen--an effing MOTH. 

Not even a big moth.

Just a regular old moth.

Monday was the first day of the liquids-only >200 calories max Act of Contrition. I was doing pretty awesome. And feeling a little lightheaded by the time I headed up to bed at around 11.00. 

I made it to my bed, practised deep breathing, and turned on Millennium.

[On that note, it is officially Lance Henriksen Blog Week. So you better believe there shall be a post in the next day or so devoted entirely to Lance and Millennium.]

So I was watching TV, curled into a fetal position (head-between-your-knees-and-kiss-your-conscious-ass-goodbye kind of fetal), and a moth lands on the screen.

Bugs with 6 or 8 legs don't really bother me. However, the knowledge that a bug is flying around my room while I'm trying to go to sleep, and it's too dark to see where the bug is--that bothers me. I can't relax. The bug needs to get the eff out of my room like now. 

I don't like killing bugs, though. Instead, I take them outside (or in winter, sneak them into the basement because I feel guilty banishing them to the cold). 

Catching a flying bug (especially a moth) without injuring it, in a bedroom that's an obstacle course constructed out of my hoard, when you've only had 180 calories for the whole day and can barely stand up = impossible. 

As much as I hate admitting defeat, I recognized that such a task was entirely beyond my capabilities at that moment. 

Thankfully, I have learned from past mistakes and had emergency food in my nightstand drawer (a single 100-calorie pack of Ritz crackers--I only keep one food item in there at a time so I can't binge in the middle of the night). I inhaled the 100 calorie pack like the giant pig I felt like for consuming something solid during a liquids-only day. But it was an emergency. I needed fuel. 

I stood.

Getting to the light switch was not an option. And I was already too far away to turn on the lamp on the nightstand. I had limited energy with which to work; had to make it count.

I sized up the moth, and then moved in, attempting to trap the moth in my hands. Even with the TV on, I couldn't really see something the size of my thumbnail. When I thought I had caught it, I walked to the door as fast as I could without blacking out. Stepped out into the hallway to release the moth near the light (yeah there was no way I was making it all the way down the stairs and then back up again).

But I hadn't caught the moth.

So then I was like ok I made it this far, I can make it to the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my face. (Your consciousness might be hanging by a thread, but that's no excuse to neglect your personal hygiene.) I made it to the bathroom, took roughly 25 minutes to brush my teeth and wash my face, and then on the way back, I turned on the light so I could have an easier time finding the moth.

The buggery bollocky  moth was gone. >:(

Now what? My energy stores were pretty much empty by then. Do I go back and turn the light off, and risk having to to the whole thing over again if the moth reappeared on the TV screen? Or do I leave the light on and hunt the moth down until I'm certain it is no longer in my bedroom?

Cue heart palpitations. 

I turned the light off. Grabbed the hairspray on my way back into bed. If the moth came back and I was unable to remove it from my bedroom, then it would have to die. Or at least get stunned with a blast of Aqua-Net. 

I settled down in my bed. Watched some Millennium. Tried to sleep.  Failed. Took another sleeping pill. Typed this, and caught up on some of your blogs. 

I start eating again tomorrow. Planned it all out and got everything ready: pre-measured almonds, roasted edamame things with wasabi

(Really delicious.)

 and some roast beef slices, a few pieces of beef jerky, and lettuce and hummus. 

I'm not really ready for serious carbs yet. I'll work on that for the end of the week.